Geneva - Three people died and several others were injured when fire swept a Geneva apartment during New Year's night. Some 200,000 people - many of whom had travelled from France, Germany and Britain - gathered in the international city for fireworks, jazz and rock concerts marking the passage to the new century.

Although police had feared a repeat of the riots which occurred during the May 1998 ministerial meeting of the Geneva-based World Trade Organisation, only a handful of serious incidents were reported.